1900 Summer Olympics / Rugby

Rugby at the II Olympic Games
information
venue	Vincennes
Competition venue	Vélodrome municipal
Nations	3
Athletes	47 (47 men)
date	14.-28. October 1900
decisions	1
London 1908 →

The international competitions for physical exercise and sport (Concours Internationaux d'Exercices Physiques et de Sports) held in the French capital Paris as part of the World Exhibition ( Exposition Universelle et Internationale de Paris ) also included two rugby games. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) assigned these games to the program of the 1900 Summer Olympics (Games of the Second Olympiad) . Rugby, which had a history in common with football until 1863 , was thus equated with football in the early history of the Olympic Games.

Teams

The management of the world exhibition had planned three games between the French selection and a club team from Germany and the United Kingdom , each of which should compete against each other. In the organizers' deliberations, however, it was not a question of a tournament, but of three equal-ranking games with their own winners and prizes. The British were unable to arrive in time for the game against Germany scheduled for October 21, so there were only two games.

Scene from the game of the German (striped jersey) against the French (white jersey) team

Match line-up for Moseley Wanderers (incorrectly called Mooseley Wanderers ) against France

At that time, team competitions were generally advertised as competitions between club or association teams. In international competitions, they usually represented the country in which the club or association was based. The German team consisted mainly of the in Frankfurt -based association football club Frankfurt (later SC 1880 Frankfurt ). The team was also strengthened by Hugo Betting from FV Stuttgart 93 and August Schmierer . The latter had left the Frankfurt soccer club in 1897 and had since been elected to the board of the Cannstatter soccer club . A selection of players from the Moseley RFC and other teams from the Midlands traveled from Great Britain under the name Moseley Wanderers . The team of the French association Union des Sociétés Françaises de Sports Athlétiques (USFSA) was actually a team that is similar to the current term of a national team . It was a selection team made up of players from the best French rugby clubs.

Games

The game between the French and the German team took place on October 14th, the match against the British on October 28th. The venue for both games was the Vélodrome municipal on the grounds of the World Exhibition in Vincennes . The most widespread variant rugby union was played , in which a team consisted of 15 players.

In the opinion of everyone involved, even the French spectators and the press, the match between France and Germany was a scandal because of incomprehensible decisions by the referee. The superiority of the German team was expressed in the lead at halftime. The longer the game went on, the more incomprehensible the French referee, Monsieur Potter, whistled. The Germans' proposal to appoint an English referee before the game had been rejected. So the suspicion of taking sides remains unresolved. 3500 spectators followed the game.

The second game was led by the same referee who was now the shadow of the first game. However, this game was devoid of any partisanship; The French team had to be considered and the result was clear. However, the British had only traveled to France the night before the game - some players had been used in a home game the day before and were therefore completely exhausted. With 6,000 spectators, the France – England game was the most popular sporting event of the entire 1900 Olympic Games.

October 14th	USFSA	-	Frankfurt football club	27:17 (5:14)
28th of October	USFSA	-	Moseley Wanderers	27: 8 (?:?)

Men

The German team from Frankfurt from
left to right: Beiler (replacement), Poppe, R. Ludwig, Hofmeister, Latscha, Müller, Wenderoth, Stockhausen, Kreuzer
middle: E. Ludwig, Reitz, Amrhein, Landvoigt, Herrmann
below: Betting, unknown , Smear

Despite the lack of character of a tournament, the IOC subsequently determined a final ranking and assigned the medal ranks, which, as shown, is also reflected in the medal table. Due to the failure of the game between the British and Germany, both teams were awarded second place. The French Collas, Gondouin, Henriquez and Sarrade made up two thirds of the French team that took part in the tug of war competition.

space	country	player
1	FRA	USFSA Vladimir Aïtoff , A. Albert , Léon Binoche , Jean Collas , Jean-Guy Gautier , Auguste Giroux , Charles Gondouin , Constantin Henriquez , J. Hervé , Victor Larchandet , Hubert Lefèbvre , Joseph Olivier , Alexandre Pharamond , Frantz Reichel , André Rischmann , Albert Roosevelt , Emile Sarrade
2	GER	Football Club Frankfurt Albert Amrhein , Hugo Betting 1 , Jacob Hermann , Willy Hofmeister , Hermann Kreuzer , Arnold Landvoigt , Hans Latscha , Erich Ludwig , Richard Ludwig , Fritz Müller , Eduard Poppe , Heinrich Reitz , August Schmierer 2 , Adolf Stockhausen , Georg Wenderoth
	GBR	Moseley Wanderers F. C. Baylis , J. Henry Birtles , James Cantion , Arthur Darby , Clement P. Deykin , L. Hood , ML Logan , HA Loveitt , Herbert S. Nicol , V. Smith , MW Talbot , JG Wallis , Claude Whittindale , Raymond Whittindale , Francis Henry Wilson

¹ Hugo Betting did not belong to the Frankfurt soccer club, but to the FV Stuttgart 93 .

² August Schmierer had meanwhile left the Frankfurt soccer club and was chairman of the Cannstatter soccer club .

literature

• Volker Kluge : Summer Olympic Games. The Chronicle I. Athens 1896 - Berlin 1936. Sportverlag Berlin, Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-328-00715-6 .
• Karl Lennartz , Walter Teutenberg: II. Olympic Games 1900 in Paris. Presentation and sources. AGON Sportverlag, Kassel 1995, ISBN 3-928562-20-7 .
• Bill Mallon : The 1900 Olympic Games . McFarland & Company, Inc., Jefferson, North Carolina 1998, CIP 97-36094.

Web links

• Side of the IOC to the Summer Games in 1900 (English)
• Official report (French, PDF, 3 parts in total; 8.10 MB)
• Page about all Olympic participants by Herman de Wael (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Ian Buchanan: Rugby Football at the Olympic Games , In: Journal of Olympic History , Vol. 1, No 1, Spring 1997, pp. 12ff, pp. 12f ( pdf ).
2. ^ Philipp Heineken: Memories of the Cannstatter Soccer Club. Verlag Hermann Meister, Heidelberg 1930. P. 86 f.
3. ^ Association history on the website of the Moseley RFC
4. ^ Rugby and the Olympics on the International Rugby Board website